It is known to use injection molding machines and injection molding systems to manufacture molded parts in large quantities and at a high speed.
The injection molding machines include at least one machine controller coupled to and in communication with various parts and sensors associated with the injection molding machine. Reference is made in this regard to U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,062,052, 6,980,882, and 6,275,741, that are all incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
Injection molding systems using hot runners rather than cold runners are used more and more often to meet these criteria and higher quality requirements for the molded parts.
These hot runner injection molding system include in general an injection molding machine such as mentioned above, a hot runner system and a mold. In many instances, additional or auxiliary equipment/components are used to improve the process or to add functions, such as additional injection units, different process sensors, robots, conveyors, cameras and computers.
There are two main categories of hot runner systems, hot runner systems using open nozzles and hot runner systems using valve gated nozzles. In both cases, the temperature in the hot runner nozzle requires more attention because of the importance of the heat profile along the hot runner nozzle and of the temperature of the molten material entering the cavity and in the cavity. In the case of the valve gated nozzles, additional attention needs to be paid to the movement of the valve pins. In many applications, pressure sensors located in the hot runner and/or in the mold are used to better monitor and influence the molding process.
It is known to use hot runner controllers to monitor and influence the molding process from the hot runner side. Reference is made in this regard to U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,518,389, 5,795,511, 6,421,577, 6,529,796, 7,128,548, 7,671,304, 7,072,735, 7,580,771, 8,165,714, U.S. Pub. Appl. No. 20040258787, U.S. Pub. Appl. No. 201103116180, U.S. Pub. Appl. No. 20120231103, and WO 2012/082 291 that are all incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
The state of the art shows that both the injection molding machine controllers and the hot runner and or mold controllers are manufactured by a large number of suppliers. These controllers include numerous proprietary, customized and non-standard hardware, architecture software and communication means that make it difficult for the users to manage the injection molding equipment and the manufacturing process efficiently and accurately and to communicate and collect all data needed in the manufacturing process.
There is a need to further increase the accuracy, efficiency, the range of functions and the communication capabilities of the hot runner controllers and of the related components/devices/equipment of the hot runner the injection molding systems.
There is a further need to provide selective and or customized control access to the hot runner injection molding systems and their controllers and associated devices using improved stationary or mobile control devices.
There is a further need to provide a user control means to have access to control data provided by hot runner and/or machine controllers manufactured by various makers that have different architectures and that are located in the same injection molding premises.
There is a further need for selective and/or customized control access to the hot runner injection molding systems and their controllers and associated devices using improved stationary or mobile control devices.
There is a further need to provide a fail-safe/fallback or a redundant controller means to prevent down-time, unexpected errors or unexpected events caused by a failure in the controllers used in hot runner the injection molding systems.
There is a further need to provide improved controllers to be used in clean-rooms or other kinds of industrial environments of the hot runner injection molding systems.